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Friday on The World: Palace intrigue in North Korea - we look for meaning in the reported execution of Kim Jon Un's uncle. Also, we ask what the US owes the Pakistani doctor said to have helped in the search of Osama Bin Laden. And Nelson Mandela's remarkable tolerance for people making fun of him.

Stories in this Edition

Muslims are required to pray five times a day — at specific times, no matter what they're doing. For New York City's Muslim cab drivers, roughly half of the 40,000 people driving cabs, that means stopping their cabs wherever they are to pray.

Updated

12/16/2013 - 2:15pm

Journalist Jesús Lemus risked his life to report on Mexico's drug war. But then he was jailed on trumped-up drug trafficking charges, accused of being the head of various cartels. But Lemus saw opportunity behind bars, and interviewed some of Mexico's most famous prisoners. Now free, Lemus has published a book filled with the stories he collected from behind bars.

In a matter of days, Jang Song Thaek went from being one of North Korea's most powerful officials to being publicly denounced as "human scum" and then, according to North Korean state-run media, being put to death.

North Korea has only one ally: China. And the reaction there to the reported execution of Jang Song Thaek has been muted. A foreign ministry spokesman said it was an internal matter. But there may be more concern below the surface.

Shakil Afridi, the Pakistani doctor who helped the CIA identify Osama bin Laden is still in jail, and he's apparently about to be hit with a new set of charges after an attempt to charge him with treason didn't stick.

Jerusalem residents may be experiencing the biggest snowstorm to hit the city in 30 or more years. The storm has brought cold and trouble from Syria to Cairo, making life harder for an area that's already embroiled in problems.

Updated

12/13/2013 - 6:00pm

Nelson Mandela was many many things, among them a lover of humor and satire. He once sat down for a 30-minute TV interview with a man in a dress pretending to be an apartheid-era Afrikaner housewife. Mandela knew that talking to the fictitious Evita Bezuidenhout was going to reach more people than appearing on the nightly news. Satirist Pieter-Dirk Uys was the man behind Evita.